Providing Operation Services for Networks via Operations Service Servers

ABSTRACT

Systems and methods of provide operations services for networks through an operations service switch. Multiple customers of the operations service may obtain operations service through the operations switch, as opposed to implementing operations services themselves. Operations service servers are in communication with the operations switch so as to be available for providing operations services to the customer accessing the operations switch. The operations switch may then establish communication links between the customer networks and the operations service servers to facilitate a centralized manner of providing operations services to the customer networks.

RELATED APPLICATIONS

The present application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application60/690,589 filed on Jun. 15, 2005, and entitled “IP OperationsManagement Services to Support Operations Services or Feature Packages,”which is incorporated herein, and the present application claimspriority to U.S. Provisional Application 60/690,577 filed on Jun. 15,2005, and entitled “Operations Switch—A New Technology to SupportOperations Services or Feature Packages,” which is incorporated herein.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present application relates to provisioning operation service fornetworks. More particularly, the present application relates toprovisioning of operation services by utilizing operation serviceservers that establish communication paths to networks requiringservice.

BACKGROUND

Entities that operate telecommunications and computing networks mustmonitor and maintain those networks. Such entities include multimediacommunication service providers, multimedia communication networkproviders, enterprise customer services and networks, large/smallbusiness services and networks, and consumer services, and homenetworks. Many of the operating tasks (i.e., provisioning, activating,and monitoring) and maintenance tasks are common among the networks ofthe various entities. However, each of these entities generally performsthe operation and maintenance themselves, using various software toolsto complete the operating and maintenance tasks. Often, the entitiesresponsible for the networks develop their own software and maintainpersonnel responsible for handling the operations services. The computersystems, software tools, and personnel involved in handling theoperations services for a network require a significant investment onthe part of the each of the entities that own the networks.

When new technology is to be added to the network, the entities areforced to develop new operations support systems or modify existing onesto fully support the new technology. This results in a delay in theimplementation of new technology and a delay in the delivery of newservices to customers. In this context, customers may include thosecustomers of a service provider network, customers of entities providingservice to an enterprise network and/or large/small business networkowned by the customer, as well as customers of entities providingservice to a consumer/home network. Ultimately, there may be asignificant loss of revenue associated with such delays in addition tothe costs associated with providing the operations support systems forthe new technology.

SUMMARY

Exemplary embodiments address these issues and others by establishingdevices, systems, and methods of providing operations services fornetworks via operations service servers. Multiple customers of theoperations service, such as customers of a service provider networkand/or customers of entities who provide services for a customer ownednetwork, may obtain operations service through one or more operationsswitches, as opposed to implementing operations services themselves.Operations for which service is provided include but are not limited toadministering, provisioning, activating, securing, monitoring,maintaining, and accounting. Such operations services may be categorizedas operation service applications and operations service features, whereoperations service features are subsets of an operations serviceapplication, such as a monitoring feature being a subset of amaintenance application. Furthermore, an assortment of operationsservice servers are in communication with the one or more operationsswitches so as to be available for providing operations services to thecustomer accessing the operations switch. The operations service serversmay then establish communication links to the customer networks to beginproviding the operations services such as in response to instructions toestablish the links that are provided by an operations switch that hasreceived the request for operations services from customers.

One embodiment is a device for providing management of operationservices of networks. The device includes a network connection andprocessor that implements an application to receive via the networkconnection requests for operations service from a first network address,the request specifying an operations service to provide to a secondnetwork address, and to establish a communication link to the secondnetwork address and to begin providing the requested operations serviceto the second network address.

Another embodiment is a method of providing operation services ofnetworks. The method involves receiving requests for operations servicesat an operation services server via a network connection, the requestoriginating from a first network address. The request specifies anoperations service and a second network address and the method furtherinvolves establishing a communication link from the operations serviceserver to the second network address in correspondence with the requestand initiating operations service over the communication link to thesecond network address.

Another embodiment is a computer readable medium that containsinstructions that when implemented perform operations includingreceiving a request for operations services from a first network addressat an operations service server, the request specifying a second networkaddress. The operations further include establishing a communicationlink by the operations service server accessing the second networkaddress over a data network. The operations further include initiatingthe requested operations service by, the operations service server overthe communication link.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 shows one example of the interconnection of an operations switchto customers and to operations service providers over variousoverlapping network layers.

FIG. 1 b shows one example of the interconnection of an operationsswitch to customers and to operations service providers over variousoverlapping network layers in order to provision operations services forthe customers.

FIG. 2 shows one example of the components of an operations switch ofFIG. 1.

FIG. 3 shows one example of the operations being performed by theoperations switch of FIGS. 1 and 1 b to establish an operations servicefor customers.

FIG. 4 shows one example of the operations being performed by theoperations switch upon the establishment of operations service forcustomers and the relationship of those operations to the operationsservice servers and the customer terminal.

FIG. 5 shows one example of an operations service server.

FIG. 6 shows on example of an operational flow of the operations serviceserver of FIG. 5.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Exemplary embodiments provide for the centralized establishment ofoperations services for customer networks from various operationsservice providers. An operations switch provides the centralized pointof management and is interconnected to the operations service serversand the customer networks. The operations switch establishescommunication links between the operations service servers and thecustomer networks so that operations service requested by customers isprovided, and the operations switch provides an interface for customersto access details and otherwise monitor the operations services beingprovided.

FIG. 1 shows one example of the interconnection between an operationsswitch (OSW) 102 of an operations service provider (OSP) network 106 andoperations service servers and customer networks. As can be seen, theOSW 102 serves as a centralized point of control and management foroperations services being provided to customers. The OSW 102 asdiscussed herein may be implemented as an Internet Protocol softswitchsuch as the Siemens hiQ 8000 and Lucent Network Controller (LNC)manufactured by Siemens and Lucent, respectively and adapted to performthe functions set forth herein. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 1, theOSW 102 resides within an Internet Protocol (IP) network 104 forpurposes of communicating with external computer systems including thoseof customers and external provider entities.

As shown, the OSW 102 interconnects with servers and/or terminals ofnetworks outside the OSP network 106. The OSP network 106 of thisembodiment is a network that is owned and operated by the OSP that isproviding the OSW 102 for access by customers in order to provide forthe establishment of operations services to the customer from operationsservice servers of other provider entities. Specifically, the OSW 102acts as a mechanism for establishing operations service betweenoperations service customers (OSC) 140, 148 and the provider entitiesinclude operations application providers (OAP) 108, 112, and 136 andoperations feature providers (OFP) 110, 116, 118, 120, and 144.Additionally, the OSW 102 may include billing features to monitor theoperations services being provided to a customer and to generate billingdata based on monitoring of those operations services being provided.

The OSCs 140, 148 are end users needing operations services, such asconfiguring and monitoring their network, network devices or services atthe customer premises. For example, an OSC may be a residential userneeding operations services for the network at their home. Likewise, theOSC may be a business user needing operations services for theenterprise or small business network. The operations services may beprovided to the network via an operations terminal (OT) 128, 142 locatedwithin the network. The OT 128, 142 may be a personal computer or otherelectronic device capable of exposing the OSC network to externalprovider networks, such as via voice and/or video. The OT 128, 142 isconnected to a provider network via a wide area network and protocol,such as via Internet Protocol routing via a broadband Internetconnection.

The OSC network 140 may be a stand-alone network not associated with aparticular service provider for establishing network connectivity. Forexample, the OSC 140 may itself be a service provider that providesnetwork connectivity for its own customers, but for purposes of thecurrent embodiment, the service provider OSC 140 is a customer of theOSP 106 and the provider entities including OAPs and OFPs. Thus, ratherthan the service provider OSC 140 being required to implement its ownoperations services to manage its own network, the service provider OSC140 may rely upon the operations services being provided from the OAPsand OFPs once established by the OSP 106 via the OSC 102.

The OSC network 148 may reside as a node of a service provider (SP)network 114, where the OSC 148 is a customer of the SP 114 while alsobeing a customer of the OSP 106 for purposes of receiving operationsservices. It will be appreciated that the SP 114 and OSP 106 may mergeas one network where the SP and OSP entity is one and the same. The SP114 may be any service provider, such as a voice over IP (VoIP)provider, a Digital Subscriber Loop (DSL) provider, or any othercommunications or non-communications provider who may require operationsservices for its network.

With respect to the operations services to be provided to the OSCs(and/or SPs), operations service servers are present within the networksof the external provider entities. As discussed above, the externalproviders may include OAPs. Each OAP has one or more operationapplication servers (OAS) that provide the application functionality ofthe operations service being subscribed to by a customer of the OSP. Asshown OAP 108 operates OAS 122, OAP 112 operates OAS 124, and OAP 136operates OAS 138. It will be appreciated that the operations applicationservices provided by the OAPs may differ such that the OAP is chosen fora particular customer subscription based on the particular operationsapplication service that it provides, or may be the same such that theOAP is chosen based on some criteria such as price to the customer orcommission to be paid to the OSC 106.

Also with respect to the operations services to be provided to the OSCsand/or SPs, the external providers may also include OFPs. Each OFP hasone or more operation feature servers (OFS) that provide the featurefunctionality of the operations service being subscribed to by acustomer of the OSP. As shown OFP 110 operations OFS 130, OFP 116operates OFS 126, OFP 118 operates OFS 132, OFP 120 operates OFS 134,and OFP 144 operates OFS 146. As with the OAPs, it will be appreciatedthat the operations feature services provided by the OFPs may differsuch that the OFP is chosen for a particular customer subscription basedon the particular operations feature service that it provides, or may bethe same such that the OFP is chosen based on some criteria such asprice to the customer or commission to be paid to the OSC 106.

As discussed below, the OSW 102 provisions the operations servicesincluding operation applications and operation features by receivingrequests from the customer via the OT 128 or other computing device andthen establishes links between the network of the customer that requiresoperations services and the operations application servers andoperations feature servers. FIG. 1 b shows one example where the OSW 102has received a request from the OT 128 and has responded by:establishing link 152 between customer network 150 and the OAS 122 toprovision one or more operation applications, establishing link 154between customer network 150 and OFS 126 to provision one or moreoperation features, by establishing link 156 between customer network150 and OAS 124 to provision one or more other operation applications,and by establishing link 158 between customer network 150 and OFS 146 toprovision one or more other operation features.

Many different operations services may be provided. For example, theoperation application services of the OAPs may include such things asservice ordering applications, where service ordering applicationsperform tasks including Service Order, Service Fulfillment and ServiceActivation. The operation application services may further include faultmanagement applications, where fault management applications performtasks including Monitoring Network Performance (such as performanceparameters of individual components or of a network as a whole), NetworkCapacity (such as capacity of individual components or of a network as awhole) and Network Faults. Additional operation application services mayinclude Capacity Management Applications, Asset/Inventory Management ofnetwork equipment as well as provisioning, configuring, and activatingof network equipment.

Likewise, the operation feature services of the OFPs, which areultimately features utilized by applications also being provided to thecustomers, may include such things as monitoring capacity of a specificnetwork where monitoring capacity involves measuring how much data perunit time can be transferred and may be performed as a subset of amaintenance application such as one being provided by an OAP. Theoperation feature services may further include monitoring of networkequipment of a specific network, where monitoring of network equipmentinvolves determining whether the network equipment has a failed or otherstatus. Additional operation feature services may include OrderActivations as part of Configuration management Applications.

The operations services may be common among technologies employed bycustomers. Thus, the operations applications and features may beconfigured to address the issues of one technology versus another.Accordingly, the OAPs and OFPs may specialize for the network operationsservices of particular customer networks implementing particulartechnologies for which operations services are needed. Furthermore, theOSPs may also specialize for the network operations services ofparticular industries such that the OAPs and OFPs that the OSPsassociate with a customer are those that specialize for the industry towhich the customer belongs.

FIG. 2 shows one embodiment of OSW 102 in greater detail. The OSW 102includes three separate servers. A first server is an application server202. A second server, which may itself include multiple serverfunctions, is a media server 204. A third server is a network server212. The OSW 102 functions to provide an access interface to the OSCs,to provide a trunk interface to the OFPs, OAPs, and to other OSPs, tointerface to various media including voice, video, and data to be usedfor monitoring of a network and the operations services being providedthereto by a customer, to interface to the customer network or to aservice provider network of the customer, and to provide networksecurity features.

The application server 202 operates to establish the subscriptions ofcustomers for the operations services. The application server 202interacts with the media server 204 to interface with the customers andto allow the customers to make selections for Resource Selection(Centralized Allocation, Geographical Location Selection) and mediaselection (Voice, Video and/or Web) of operations services and tomonitor those operations services being provided. The application server202 interacts with the network servers 212 to establish the connectionbetween the operations service servers and the OT of the customers sothat the operations services can be provided from the operations serviceservers.

Additionally, the application server 202 maintains one or more databases214. The one or more databases 214 include a database segment 216 thatstores information about the customers of the OSP, including the networkaddress of each of the OTs for which operations service will beprovided. The database segment 218 stores information about theoperations service servers, and corresponding network addresses, thatare available to customers via the OSP including all of the OASs andOFSs of the external providers. The database segment 220 stores theoperations services that are available for selection by customers andthat are provided by the operations service servers of segment 218,where the operations services may be provided by multiple operationservice servers of segment 218 and wherein either the customer or theOSC may choose which operations service server is to be included for thesubscription. Database segment 222 stores the subscription associationsfor each customer, where each subscription associates a customer OT withan operations service server for providing the operations servicedesired by the customer to the OT and the corresponding customernetwork.

The application server 202 functions to provide the customer withselections for management services of the operations services beingprovided, including network configuration, network fault detection,network performance detection, network capacity detection, networksecurity detection (such as monitoring access attempts to a customernetwork including log-in validation), network account management, andcustomer installation management. The application server 202 may providefor prioritization of the operations services being provided.Furthermore, the application server 202 may provide for announcementsvia the media servers 204, including via the web IWR 206, voice IVR 208or video IVDR 210. Furthermore, the application server 202 may provideprompts and greetings for customers accessing their operation servicesaccount, and may provide accounting and billing functions includingproviding such information to the customer for review.

The media server 204 functions to provide centralized allocation andgeographical location selection for customers. Additionally, the mediaserver 204 provides for interactive voice response (IVR 208),interactive video response (IVDR 210), and/or interactive web response(IWR 206) for exchanging information with the customer regarding theoperations services being provided, including the operation applicationsand operation features provided from the provider entities.

The network server 212 functions to provide centralized routing, such asIP routing, including transaction based routing, and policy basedcontrol. Specifically, the network server 212 may map the OSC locationregister to the operations service servers to provide the operationsservices to the OSCs. The network server 212 will with multipleapplication servers 202 to route a call to a specific destination OSC106 (i.e. multiple OTs). A network server 212 will be able to servemultiple distributed application servers 202 within an OSW 102.

The OSW 102 communicates with both the operations service servers andthe OTs of the customer networks. As shown, the OSC 148 may communicatewith the OSW 102 via a communication link between the OT 128 and themedia server 204 and/or directly with the application server 202 such asvia an application-specific user interface. Such communications may beto subscribe to operations services and then to monitor the provisioningof those services, including reviewing account and billing information.Likewise, the OSW 102 may communicate with the operations serviceservers, including the OASs and OFSs by the network server 212 routingcommunications via a network gateway 224 that leads to the network core104 where the OSW resides. The network core 104, such as an IP core, maythen be a network capable of routing the communications from the OSW 102to the individual networks and servers of the provider entities (i.e.,OAS 122 of OAP 108, OFS 132 of OFP 118), as well as to other OSWs 228and of the same or other OSPs 226.

FIG. 3 illustrates one example of the operations of the OSW 102 toestablish the operations services for customer networks. Initially, thecustomer accesses the OSW 102 at access operation 302, such as bycontacting the media server 204 via the web, voice, or video in order tocreate a subscription for services. The customer then selects thesubscription to operations services from the set of operations servicesmade available by the OSW 104 and as defined in the operations servicesdatabase that is being maintained at selection operation 304.

Upon the application server 202 having received the selection, eitherdirectly or through the interaction with the media servers 204, theapplication server adds the customer to the customer database atcustomer operation 306. The application server 202 then determines theoperations service server for the selected operations service at serveroperation 308. For example, the application server 202 may find that thecustomer has chosen an operations application or feature to which thereis only a single operations application or feature provider. In thatcase, the operations service server of that one provider is determinedto be the operations service server for this customer request. Asanother example, the application server 202 may find that the customerhas chosen an operations application or feature to which there aremultiple operations application or feature providers. In that case, theapplications server 202 may apply particular criteria to determine whichoperations service server should be selected, where the criteria may beto select the provider entity offering the best price for the customerwhere the provider entities may charge different rates for the sameservice, or may be to select the provider entity offering the bestcommission for the OSP that is associating the customer with theoperations service.

Upon the application server 202 having determined the appropriateoperations service server, the application server 202 creates asubscription association at subscription operation 310. Here, theassociation includes the operations service selected, the operationsservice server that has been determined to be the best choice forproviding the selected operations service, and the customer information.Upon the subscription being created, the application server 202 theninitiates the provisioning of the operations service at routingoperation 312. The operations service is provisioned by causing thenetwork server 212 to route a request to the relevant operations serviceserver for the subscription to then direct the operations service serverto begin providing the operations service to the customer network of thesubscription.

The functions of the various servers including those of the OSW 102 ofFIG. 3 and also those of the various operations service servers may beembodied as a computer readable medium, such as storage includingmagnetic, electronic, and optical formats as well as propagated signalstraveling via wired or wireless connections.

FIG. 4 shows an example of the interaction that may occur between theOSW 102, the operations service servers 124, 132, and the customernetwork 128 while the operations service is being provisioned. Atmonitoring operation 402, the OSW 102 includes the application server202 monitoring the operations service servers 124, 132 that areproviding operations services for a particular customer in order todetermine what the customer should be billed, such as where theoperations service is not a fixed charge but varies depending upon theactions taken on behalf of the customer. At monitoring operation 404,the application server 202 monitors for any desired customer control ofoperations service that may be received and implements any change of theoperations service due to the customer control by communicating with therelevant operations service server 124, 132.

The OSW 102 also maintains communications with the customer network 128by allowing the customer network 128 to access the application server202 such as via the media server 204 at communication operation 406.Here, the customer may request monitoring information about theoperations services being provided, such as to view the manner in whichfaults have been detected and handled, view the current capacity of thenetwork, view the current status of various network equipment, etc.Furthermore, the customer may request or otherwise be provided withbilling information, such as a current account balance. Additionally,the customer may submit control information such as to manipulate theoperations service being provided, and where the control information maythen be implemented as discussed above for monitor operation 404.

It will be appreciated that through the OSW 102, the customers mayrequest operations services be provided for their networks while the OSW102 than establishes the requested services by calling upon theappropriate operations service servers available to the OSW 102. Thus,it will further be appreciated that the OSW 102 may establish the sameor similar operations services for multiple customers, thereby takingadvantage of the ability of the provider entities to offer operationsservices to multiple networks while providing the multiple customers acentralized point of management for the operations services beingprovided. The customers are thereby relieved from having to implementsuch operations services themselves.

FIG. 5 shows one exemplary embodiment of an operations service server500 in accordance with the systems discussed above. The operationsservice server 500 is a computing system that includes a processor 502implementing a server application. The processor 502 may be a generalpurpose programmable processor where the server application is asoftware application residing on a storage device or in memory that iseither external to or internal to the processor 502. Additionally, theoperations service server 500 includes a network interface 504, such asan Ethernet interface or other type of interface that couples theoperations service server 500 to external networks 506. Within theexternal networks 506, the operations service server 500 receivesrequests and provides acknowledgements to the operations switchesdiscussed above. Additionally, the operations service servers establishcommunication links to customer networks and initiating the operationsservices over the communication links formed in the external networks506.

FIG. 6 shows on example of an operational flow of an operations serviceserver 500. The operations service server 500 receives an incomingrequest from the network 506 where the request has originated from anoperations switch at a first network address, such as those operationswitches discussed above. Presumably, a customer has establishedcommunication with the operations switch to request a particularoperations service. The request received by the operations serviceserver 500 at request operation 602 is the direct result of that requestto the operations switch by the customer. The request providesinformation necessary for the operations service server 500 to providethe requested service. Namely, the request provides a second networkaddress that corresponds to an entry point to the customer network.Additionally, the request provides an identification of the particularservice that has been requested and/or any parameters necessary forproviding the service, such as service options that have beenpre-selected by the customer when communicating with the operationsswitch.

After having received the request, the operations service server 500then configures the operations service per the request at configurationoperation 604, including implementing the service application necessaryto provide the functions of the requested service in accordance with anyoptions or other configuration information already specified by therequest. The operations service server 500 then establishes acommunication link by initiating communications with the customernetwork at the second network address and upon reaching a live address,then beginning the operations service that has been requested over theestablished communication link at service operation 606. Thecommunication link may be an IP based point-to-point communication thatcontinues so long as the operations service remains active, i.e., untilthe operations service server receives another request for terminationof the operations service or until a natural expiration of the serviceas may have already been specified in the initial request. Examples ofthe operations services including operation applications and operationfeatures that may be provided by the operations service server 500 havebeen set forth above.

While the invention has been particularly shown and described withreference to various embodiments thereof, it will be understood by thoseskilled in the art that various other changes in the form and detailsmay be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of theinvention.

What is claimed is:
 1. An operations service server comprising: a processor; and a memory having stored thereon instructions which, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perform operations comprising: receiving a request from an operations switch associated with a first network address, wherein the request includes a second network address associated with a customer network and specifies an operations service to provide to the customer network associated with the second network address, wherein the second network address is an IP address; configuring the operations service based on the request; causing a second communication link to the customer network to be established, wherein the second communication link is an IP based point-to-point link between the operations service server and the second network address that remains active until a request for termination of the operations service is received by the operations service server; and causing the operations service to be provided to the customer network at the second network address over the second communication link.
 2. The operations service server of claim 1, wherein the operations service comprises a fault management application that handles faults within the customer network associated with the second network address.
 3. The operations service server of claim 1, wherein the operations service comprises a security management application that maintains security for access attempts to the customer network associated with the second network address.
 4. The operations service server of claim 1, wherein the operations service comprises an asset and inventory management application that handles asset and inventory management tasks for the customer network associated with the second network address.
 5. The operations service server of claim 1, wherein the operations service comprises a provisioning, a configuration, and an activation feature for network equipment of the customer network associated with the second network address.
 6. The operations service server of claim 1, wherein the customer network associated with the second network address corresponds to a network of a plurality of customer networks that include service provider networks operated by service providers.
 7. The operations service server of claim 1, wherein the customer network associated with the second network address corresponds to a network of a plurality of customer networks operated by users of service providers.
 8. A method, comprising: receiving, by a processor in an operations service server, a request from an operations switch associated with a first network address, wherein the request includes a second network address associated with a customer network and specifies an operations service to provide to the customer network associated with the second network address, wherein the second network address is an IP address; configuring, by the processor, the operations service based on the request; and causing a communication link to the customer network to be established, wherein the communication link is an IP based point-to-point link between the operations service server and the second network address that remains active until a request for termination of the operations service is received by the operations service server; and causing the operations service to be provided over the communication link to the customer network at the second network address.
 9. The method of claim 8, wherein providing the operations service over the communications link to the customer network at the second network address comprises providing a fault management service that handles faults within the customer network associated with the second network address.
 10. The method of claim 8, wherein providing the operations service over the communications link to the customer network at the second network address comprises providing a security management service that maintains security for access attempts to the customer network associated with the second network address.
 11. The method of claim 8, wherein providing the operations service over the communications link to the customer network at the second network address comprises providing an asset and inventory management service for the asset and inventory management of network equipment of the customer network.
 12. The method of claim 8, wherein providing the operations service over the communications link to the customer network at the second network address comprises providing a service for provisioning, configuring, and activating network equipment of the customer network.
 13. The method of claim 8, wherein the customer network associated with the second network address corresponds to a network of a plurality of customer networks that include service provider networks operated by service providers.
 14. The method of claim 8, wherein the customer network associated with the second network address corresponds to a network of a plurality of customer networks operated by users of service providers.
 15. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium having encoded thereon computer readable instructions that, when executed by a processor of an operations service server, cause the processor to perform operations according to the instructions comprising: receiving, from an operations switch associated with a first network address, a request, the request including a second network address associated with a customer network and specifying an operations service to provide to the customer network associated with the second network address, wherein the second network address is an IP address; configuring the operations service based on the request; causing a communication link to the customer network to be established, wherein the communication link is an IP based point-to-point link between the operations service server and the second network address that remains active until a request for termination of the operations service is received by the operations service server; and causing the operations service to be provided over the communication link to the customer network at the second network address.
 16. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the instructions for providing the operations service further comprise instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perform providing a fault management service that handles faults within the customer network associated with the second network address.
 17. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the instructions for providing the operations service further comprise instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perform providing a security management service that maintains security for access attempts to the customer network associated with the second network address.
 18. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the instructions for providing the operations service further comprise instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perform providing an asset and inventory management service for the asset and inventory management of network equipment of the customer network.
 19. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the instructions for providing the operations service further comprise instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to perform providing a service for provisioning, configuring, and activating network equipment of the customer network.
 20. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium of claim 15, wherein the customer network associated with the second network address corresponds to a network of a plurality of customer networks including service provider networks operated by service providers and networks operated by users of service providers. 